2

In honor of my cousin, Alissa's recent posts about animals she has no love for...

2 is the number of snakes I have seen in my yard this week. And trust me, we have many more snakes than just thoes two camping out in our yard. It is not unusual for us to see 5 or 6 snakes a week in the summer. For the record, I dislike them immensely. (In fact, I was going to put a picture of snakes at the top of this post but then once I looked for images online I realized that even the pictures give me the heebyjeebies.) They're just garter snakes but still it's offputting. My brains gets that they are harmless and that they are helping to keep the mice population down. But I don't appreciate the quickness with which they move or the way that they surprise you when you bend down or turn a corner. I would really like to be rid of them. I think they nest in a retaining wall that we share with a neighbor, that is made out of old railroad ties. But the weird thing is all the snake ridding ideas I've seen like putting down rough surfaces like mulch and having large pets are things we already have done and we still have snakes. We have a large double lot but we don't have any areas of tall grass for them to hide in. We live in town for pity sake! We are not supposed to have snakes! So for now I'm left awaiting my greatest fear...the moment Kenson decides they are playthings and thus picks one up! (I think I'm safe for a while; he was a bit scared of the baby kittens we saw last week that were so tiny they still had their eyes shut.)

Snake update-make that 4! I just was outside doing gardening things and found 2 more so that makes 3 I saw today and one on Tuesday. Urrr!

Image courtesy of http://www.flickr.com/photos/historicdundee/946607005/ (Taken in downtown Omaha!)